Shan Masood said that their side had lots of positives to take home despite their 79-run defeat in the Boxing Day Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Shan Masood on Pakistan’s defeat in Boxing Test
Pat Cummins-led Australia won the second match against Shan Masood-led Pakistan by 79 runs on Pakistan’s Australia tour 2023 at Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Pakistan batters Masood, Babar Azam, and Agha Salma fought hard and had a positive attitude in Melbourne on Day 04, but Australian players Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc showed impressive bowling skills to win the Test series. Australia won the match and led the series 2-0.
After winning the toss in the second test, Pakistan chose to bowl where they concluded the first day with bagging 3 wickets for 187 runs.
However, Australia concluded their innings with 318 runs in their first innings. Despite an impressive performance in the morning session, where Pakistan took seven wickets to dismiss Australia before lunch.
The extras turned out to be the second-highest contributor to Australia’s runs on the second day of the Test match.
Pakistan lost all 10 wickets on scoring 264 runs in their first innings. Australia started their second innings with 54 runs lead and scored 262 runs where Mitchell Marsh scored 96 runs, Alex Carey and Steven Smith smashed half-centuries.
With a trail of 316 runs, Pakistan started their second innings where Shan Masood and Agha Salman smashed half-centuries. By the end, Pakistan scored 237 runs and lost the match by 79 runs.
While speaking in the post-match conference, Shan Masood said, “We have to look at the bigger picture. There were a lot of positives. We can easily be like, ‘what if we did this, what if we did that?’
“That’s all and part and process of the game. There were a lot of positives but if you give a quality side like Australia a sniff, which we did, maybe sometimes with the bowl, maybe sometimes with the bat, yesterday maybe in the field we dropped someone in form like Marsh, we might not have been chasing so many today. Mistakes happen.”
“In terms of the bigger picture, this is the way we want to play Test cricket. Playing Test cricket in these conditions, fighting till the end, where a result was possible for us, that’s something we have to take forward as a team.”
“It’s a reflection of four days, the game kept turning. Sometimes it’d go Australia’s way, sometimes ours. We were fortunate to win the toss and have the best of the bowling conditions,” he added.
“We were leading with the bat when me and Abdullah had a good partnership, Pat Cummins came in with that spell and that’s why he’s one of the best bowlers in the world.”
“In the second innings, Steve Smith and Mitchell Marsh’s partnership, that put us back again. We have taken 20 wickets which we haven’t done in Australia for a while, that’s a box ticked.”
“In terms of runs, everyone got good starts, there were some nice fifties, but in Test cricket against quality sides, you want to get the hundreds. A lot to work on, but this is the blueprint with which we want to play Test cricket.”
“Hopefully we keep doing that. They are ruthless, you want to convert the fifties into hundreds. That’s what we have to do as a batting unit. They have some world-class bowlers in their ranks, if you give them a sniff you might not have enough runs on the board,” said Shan Masood.
“It’s WTC, every Test match counts. Very happy with how we played the game, it’s just about the finishing touches and winning the crucial moments like the Australians did in this game.”
“The groundsmen did a wonderful job, one of the better Test pitches that we have played on, something for everyone. Very glad that we got to play such an exciting Test match,” he concluded.
Australia and Pakistan will be playing their third test match starting on January 03, at Sydney Cricket Ground.
